Aftermath
by TB's LMC
Summary: After the events of Season 2 Episode 20 "Ha'alele," Danny is well and truly pissed off and decides there's no way in hell he's letting Steve do this to the team. Not again…not after what happened in North Korea. No slash. Warning for colorful language.
1. Chapter 1

_**Summary**: After the events of Season 2 Episode 20 "Ha'alele," Danny is well and truly pissed off and decides there's no way in hell he's letting Steve do this to the team. Not again…not after what happened in North Korea._

_**Author's Note**: I'm quite certain this is alternate universe (AU) since I highly doubt the show will scrap their rest-of-season scripts and episodes in favor of my story._

_**Warnings**: Spoilers for Season 2 opener and Season 20 Episode 20. Also a warning for foul language, so turn back now if you have delicate ears. No slash, but your bromance meter might go a bit off-scale._

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**AFTERMATH**

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It wasn't entirely without precedent that Danny and Steve were sometimes on their own or paired up with someone else to do this, that or the other thing on a case.

Sometimes Steve and Chin paired up. Sometimes Danny and Kono. Sometimes Danny and Chin. Sometimes Steve and Kono.

And sometimes they went off following up leads on their own for a variety of reasons. Just because cops had partners didn't mean they were with that partner twenty-four/seven, even while on the clock.

Thing was, though, that in this particular case, there was only one reason Danny'd gone off to question a witness in Five-0's latest case that afternoon all by his lonesome and that was because Steve was gone. Not missing, exactly, because he at least had the decency to communicate via a 'Dear Danno' letter, and Danny assumed Steve knew exactly where he was even if no one else who cared about him did.

Once the Trashman was taken care of they immediately got handed another case, but it was one of those slow-going lots-of-research ones. Danny therefore finally had down time to process what Steve had done. It was down time he really wished he didn't have.

Having just spent two weeks camped out on Chin's and Malia's couch, Danny decided he'd overstayed his welcome and chose to squat at Casa McGarrett, if for no other reason than to make as big a mess as possible so that when Steve came back from wherever the fuck he'd gone this time, he'd have a reason to get pissed off with Danny for messing up his house like he did when Steve was on the _U.S.S. Enterprise_ for a week.

Because Danny's logic was this: if a fight starts because Steve is pissed over the state of his house, then Danny can justifiably mouth off in response and circle it around to what the actual _fuck_ Steve thinks he's doing going off half-cocked all alone to God-knows-where chasing after Joe Motherfucking White.

_Did Steve ever stop to think that Wo Fat might just use the opportunity of Steve being away to come after his team? Did he? Huh?_

_Did he even remember that the last time he went off on some stupid mission having to do with Wo Fat that he'd had to be rescued by his team, a bunch of non-combat-trained Hawaii cops armed like they were Special Forces?_

_Did he even care that Danny Williams had willingly gone off to his own possible death, the possibility of leaving his daughter _forever_ to save Steve's ass the last time he went to do something without his _ohana_ to back him up?_

_Did he?_

Did_ he?_

Oh, Danny didn't just have a rant built up. He had a full four-hour lecture with no room for bathroom breaks and no Q&A session planned.

_How self-centered and narcissistic can a bastard be? "The best the Navy has" certainly didn't do very well in North Korea, now, did he? No. He needed a Jersey cop, a rookie and his father's former HPD partner with a bunch of SEALs and his old instructor for backup on that little foray into what-the-fuckery._

Danny would've been perfectly fine dealing with this situation if it'd been Steve getting recalled to active duty for a SEAL job. Hell, he'd been expecting it for the past couple of years, _fully_ expecting the U.S. Navy would need Steve for something since he was such a fucking golden boy in their eyes according to the former (now-dead completely untrustworthy bitch of a) governor.

He'd been prepared, once he'd seen the scrawl on the envelope, to find out that's exactly what'd happened. That Steve would get to play Cryptic Bastard by saying he couldn't tell any of them where he was going or how long he'd be gone or anything else because it was classified SEAL playtime. Danny would have gotten worried like any good war wife, thank you very much, but it would've been something he could deal with on the knowledge that Steve was being protected by a SEAL team, that he wasn't alone, that he was acting under clear orders with a clear mission, clear goal, clear boundaries and some sort of time frame.

_But that's not what Danny now had to deal with. No. He had to deal with a man who either felt he couldn't trust his _ohana_ with whatever had suddenly spurred him into taking off in the middle of the night, or who felt he was being a valiant and self-sacrificing martyr by sparing his team from whatever horrors he thought he might find in searching for Joe Motherfucking White._

_God, how Danny hated that man. How he wished he'd never contacted him when Steve had been in jail for murder. How he hated himself for thinking the man would help Steve. He hadn't. He hadn't fucking helped Steve at _all_. All the man had done was drive Steve around the bend with regards to his father, his mother, Wo Fat, Noshimuri and goddamn Shell-fucking-burne._

_Of _course_ Steve couldn't let that shit go, and part of Danny was pretty goddamn sure White had known that when he'd supposedly revealed the identity of Shellburne at the cemetery over the elder McGarrett's grave. Joe knew Steve better than anyone in Steve's life, Danny was sure. So he _had_ to have known Steve wouldn't let it go at that, especially once Joe up and left Hawaii right after._

_Oh, how Danny hated Joe White. Fucking _fuck_._

Danny looked down at his hand in surprise, not really registering at first the fact that there was blood covering it. Blood, bits of glass and then oh, wow, it hurt, too.

Blinking, he looked up at the lanai door as the distant sound of thunder reached his ears. When lightning flashed he saw he'd gone and punched a hole right through the window in the door. Right through.

Blind rage.

Blind _panic_, more like.

Yet another thing to yell at Steve for if he ever came back.

When.

_When_ he came back.

Danny opened the lanai door and walked out onto the beach. It was dark. Probably well after ten at night, he guessed. When the first drops of rain began to fall, he didn't move.

When the drops turned into a downpour, lightning flashing and deafening thunder surrounding him, he still didn't move.

Blood dripped off his fingers from the wounded hand that hung down at his side. It seeped into the sand, all traces removed by the driving rain.

Small whitecaps on the usually calm waters.

Hair plastered to his head, gel being rinsed away, soaking down into his shirt with the rain.

Every bit of fabric on his body clinging to every inch of his skin.

And the blood. Dripping. Disappearing.

If Steve didn't come back this time, there was no way of knowing where to go to find him. No way to rescue him. No one to call and try to pry Top Secret information out of as to his last known location.

No Joe White to call since he was the goddamn _problem_.

The SEAL team wouldn't know.

The governor didn't know.

And Steve wasn't answering his phone.

Danny's eyes widened.

Steve's phone.

His _phone_.

Danny turned and ran back into Steve's house. He beelined it to the kitchen table, leaving a trail of sloppy wet footprints in his wake. He could almost hear the water dripping from his hair, his soaked clothes as he grabbed his phone off the table, wet hands making it almost slip out of his grip to the floor.

Quickly he dialed Chin's number.

They could locate Steve with his _phone_.

Chin agreed to meet him at the palace.

Danny didn't dry off. He didn't change clothes. He did nothing but grab his keys and race out the front door.

He didn't even set the alarm.

He called Kono. She was on her way thirty seconds later.

They would find Steve. They _would_.

And they'd make sure once and for all that he knew he was _never_ doing this to them again. _Never_ going anything alone. _Never_. _Again_.

The cousins and Danny would see to it, and if worse came to worst, Danny would employ his secret weapon: Grace Williams.

Because even bad-ass motherfucking Navy SEALS couldn't resist _those_ brown eyes.

In spite of his hurt hand…his wet underwear…his soggy shoes…his slowly drying and curling hair…the pouring-down rain that made it nearly impossible to see the hood of his Camaro…Danny smiled at the thought.

Fuck Steve if he thought Danny and Chin and Kono would just be okay with a stupid letter like the one he'd left. Fuck Steve if he thought they'd sit around with their thumbs up their asses while he played Where's Fucking Waldo like a one-man army.

Fuck Steve if he died before Danny had a chance to kill him himself for pulling this on them all.


	2. Chapter 2

"Yeah," Danny said, by way of answering his phone without sounding as peeved as he was.

Because it was Chin calling and yeah, okay, no reason to snap at Chin.

"Kono's already got the comp fired up," Chin reported. "I'm on my way into the palace now."

"I'm there in three minutes," Danny stated before hanging up.

Thirty seconds later his phone rang again.

"Yeah, Kono."

"I'm bringing up the GPS for Steve's phone, but there's a problem."

Danny's scowl deepened. "That being?"

"He coded it so only you could get into it."

Very nearly plowing into a car that stopped fast in front of him at a red light, Danny slammed on the brakes. "What the _hell_ are you talking about?" he practically shrieked, the Camaro's bumper barely a quarter of an inch from whacking the one in front of it. "Goddamn tourists."

"Danny, he's got it passcoded," Kono replied.

Then Chin's voice joined the mix. "She's not kidding. Steve's got it so only _you_ can unlock his signal, _brah_."

"Of all the—" Danny spluttered. "Well what the hell's the passcode?"

There was such silence in response that Danny could hear his car's engine idling. Normally he couldn't. Then again, normally Steve had the tires squealing, so, you know, that could've been a contributing factor.

"You don't know it."

"That would be a no," Chin replied.

Danny sighed. "Try my daughter. Anything having to do with my daughter, I don't know!"

"I'm going to take it he's never talked to you about this."

"You would be taking it correctly, Kono," Danny sighed as the light turned green and the idiot in the rental car in front of him _slowly_ hit the gas. "That's it. Jesus, I hate tourists!" Danny griped. He flipped the sirens and lights on, successfully scaring the hell out of the poor tourist couple, who jerked over to the curb so fast they took out a trash can.

Okay, Danny felt bad about the trash can.

"You've turned into _kamaʻāina, brah_! _Hoʻomaikaʻi ʻana_!"

"As soon as I decode that with the special ring I got out of the box of _Sugar Smacks_ this morning, I'll ask Grace how to respond to you. Speaking of which, you figured out the passcode yet?"

"I've tried every combination of Grace's name, including her middle. I've tried her birthday. I'm out of ideas," Chin stated.

"_Sugar Smacks_?" Kono repeated, sounding rather bewildered.

Danny screeched to a stop in his standard parking place, grabbed his phone off the dashboard mount and got out of the car so fast even _he_ wasn't sure he'd shut the door behind him. He ran full-tilt into the palace, finding out the hard way that extremely soggy shoes, socks and clothing in general did _not_ mix well with the smooth, highly polished (and ridiculously waxed) floors of their esteemed headquarters.

Which was why Chin and Kono, having heard a terrible gut-wrenching sound followed by Danny's phone going dead, found him thirty seconds later with his back plastered against the double doors , every dripping wet inch of him more pissed off than either cousin had ever seen him.

Chin cocked his head and held his hand out.

Danny glared, but accepted the hand.

Kono picked up his busted phone.

Without a word, the three trudged (or in Danny's case, squelched) into the bullpen.

On the computer table's touch-screen, and on every screen hanging all around the room on the walls or from the ceiling, was a box asking for the passcode. Beneath the box was typed _DW Only_.

"That rat bastard, even with something like _this_ he's got to be _difficult_."

"Well, it's got to be something he figured only _you_ would know," Kono said, raising an eyebrow when Danny ran a hand through his hair and it…curled.

Chin tried hard not to roll his eyes but failed miserably. "Look, maybe we shouldn't do this," he said, earning a patented Williams glare. "I'm not kidding, Danny. Maybe Steve's got his reasons for going after Joe White on his own."

"I don't _care_ what his reasons are," Danny growled. "Has everyone here forgotten what happened the _last_ time he went off half-cocked on his own? We all had to go _after_ him!"

"Yeah, Danny, we did," Kono said. "Joe White included."

Danny opened his mouth nice and wide to reply, but his retort died in his throat. Not because of what Kono had said, but because of what he saw appear directly behind her.

Or, more appropriately, _who_ he saw appear.

"Steve?" he practically squeaked.

The cousins whipped around to find that, sure enough, not only was Danny _not_ hallucinating, but Steve McGarrett was not alone.

"Wo Fat?" Chin said incredulously.

For standing there just inside the bullpen's double glass doors was Steve carrying Wo Fat over his shoulder. And not only was he handcuffed, but well and truly unconscious.

"Book him," Steve said to Chin, though his eyes never left Danny's.

Kono and Chin took charge of the prisoner, both sparing one last glance at Steve – who seemed completely unharmed – and Danny – who looked like he'd shrunk to half his normally slightly diminutive stature – before hauling Wo Fat between them toward the holding area.

You could have heard a pin drop.

Steve's eyes traveled from Danny's goofy hair all the way down his dripping clothing to the puddle that had gathered on the floor beneath him. Then they moved up and he frowned, kicking his head back, eyes fixed on a point somewhere near Danny's hip. "What'd you do to your hand?"

Danny looked down at his hand.

Oh, yeah. It hurt.

"Punched a hole through your window."

"Danno, you got anger management issues."

"No, I _don't_," Danny seethed, squelching across the bullpen until he was standing right in front of his partner. "I've got _abandonment_ issues. As in _you_, my You're-The-Backup partner, once again flying off to wherever you damn well please without _any_ of your team, without even a _SEAL_ team for backup, all to find the guy who—goddammit, Steve, what the—_mmfff_!"

Steve raised an eyebrow when Danny's mouth continued to move even though his hand was covering it nice and tight. He couldn't help but smirk when Danny finally stopped trying to talk and instead chose to glare.

"Okay," Steve finally said, keeping his hand, fingers-closed, palm-flat against his partner's mouth. "You are not going to say a word now. It's _my_ turn. Got me?"

Danny continued to glare.

"You're the one who's always saying I can kill a man with a hangnail," Steve said. Then he schooled his face into the meanest-looking one in his repertoire. "I have _two_ hangnails at the moment, Daniel."

Danny's eyes widened.

Steve narrowed his eyes. "We on the same page, partner?"

Danny nodded slowly.

Steve kept his hand in place because…_Danny_.

Yep. _Danny_. Who tried to talk again.

Steve sighed. "Hand's not coming off until you hear me out."

Danny frowned, crossed his arms over his chest and glared.

Steve decided he had to hurry because Danny spit on his palm. Ew.

"Joe called me," Steve explained, "said he had been captured by Wo Fat."

Danny raised a hand in the air, finger jutting out from his fist, and tried to open his mouth to say something.

So Steve squeezed, hand fitting completely around Danny's jaw with little to no effort whatsoever.

Danny huffed.

Steve made a face. Because…yeah. Ew.

"And Wo Fat's men had your daughter in his sights. If something happened to him by Joe's hand, they were going to kill Grace."

Danny went completely still, eyes bugging out of his head.

Steve decided it was time to remove his hand. When he did, he wiped it on his cargo pants because…ew.

But Danny was completely speechless.

"I couldn't tell you, I couldn't just put a protective detail on Grace. The first sign of cops, they would've taken her, Danny."

For his part, Danny very much resembled a fish out of water. Jaw dropped, gaping openly up at Steve.

"Joe wanted me to know so I could keep Gracie safe. But I knew that I had to go to the source. That if I caught Wo Fat once and for all, his men would go underground until a new pecking order had been established. With Wo Fat out of commission, his agenda would be wiped away and Grace would be safe." Steve reached out and put a hand on Danny's wet shoulder. "You _all_ would be, my sister included."

"And Joe?" Danny finally found his voice enough to ask.

Steve shook his head. "He didn't make it." He turned away from his partner. "Sacrificed himself so I could get Wo Fat out of Japan and back here to be charged with the crimes he's committed in this state."

Danny's face fell. "Grace?"

"She's safe, Danny. I called her just before I came into the palace. She's safe."

This time it was Danny who turned away. And, who didn't say a word. He was silent enough that Steve wondered if he'd actually left the room, so he turned around, only to find Danny with shoulders slumped and hands jammed into his pockets.

"You should call her. I told her I'd have you call her," Steve offered.

"I broke my phone."

Total silence. Danny could hear himself dripping all over the floor.

Finally Steve sighed. "I'm sorry, Danny, but…I did it for Grace. For Joe. For the team." More silence. "You never would've forgiven me if something had happened to Gracie."

Danny turned around, and when he did his eyes were bright with unshed tears. "I'm the one who should be sorry. And I am. About doubting you. About…about Joe. I'm just…" Danny turned and started heading toward his office.

He didn't know what to think.

Didn't know what to say.

Everything he'd thought and said since reading Steve's letter had been so…so _wrong_.

He didn't quite understand it all yet. How Joe and Japan and Wo Fat and Gracie were all mixed up together. How it was Steve had found and caught Wo Fat _and_ managed to get him back to the island from Japan.

But what he didn't understand most of all was why the hell he'd been such a…such a goddamn…

"I am such a prick," he sighed as he entered his office.

He was startled when Steve's voice came from right behind him. "Yeah, but you're _my_ prick."

Danny's eyes widened. He turned around to find his partner _very_ unsuccessfully attempting to stifle a laugh. A laugh that turned into an all-out guffaw as soon as he saw the look on Danny's face.

"You," Danny said in mock-outrage. "That did _not_ sound right. What would happen if Chin and Kono overheard you, do you _know_ the kind of scuttlebutt around this place about us already and you're standing here, _looming_ like _Neanderthal_ saying I'm your _prick_, what the _hell_ is the matter with you, Steven?"

Steve managed to stop laughing and gasping for air enough to say, "That's the passcode, by the way."

Danny's rant spluttered to a halt. "What is? Prick?"

Steve belly-laughed. "No!"

"You have the manners of a street rat. You are _such_ a Neanderthal."

"Yep. That's it."

"You made _Neanderthal_ your _pass_code?"

Steve grinned.

"Well, it suits you. You _are_ one, you know," he huffed, crossing his arms and trying…but failing…to not smile.

"Yeah, maybe I am. But I'm _your_ Neanderthal, right?"

Danny took a deep breath, but instead of unleashing further verbal acoustics upon the ears of one Steven J. McGarrett, he simply said, "Take me home and get me out of these clothes."

They both heard a snort behind Steve. Steve, whose eyes widened.

The partners turned around to look.

"Not a _word_," Steve said threateningly to the two cousins who were standing in front of the computer table with matching _OMG_ looks on their faces. "Not. One. _Word_."

Kono and Chin held up their hands defensively, then mimed zipping their lips shut.

"Come on," Steve said to Danny.

Kono looked at Danny.

Danny looked at Chin.

Chin stared at Steve, then turned to Kono. "Guess we'll get the story tomorrow."

"Yeah," Kono nodded with an evil grin. "But which one?"

"And there goes the rumor mill," Danny groused as he splotched and squished and squelched after his partner.

His partner, who apparently had nearly singlehandedly – with the help of a hero named Joe White – captured one of the worst criminals in the world, saved his entire team and kept the life of one small little girl named Grace Williams intact.

Let the rumor mill do its worst.

Because Danny had been wrong. And if the way he had to pay for it was by enduring comments about him being wet and going to Steve's house to take his clothes off, well…as long as Grace never got wind of it, he could live with that.

Things could be worse.

Because Grace could be dead.

Or Steve.

Or _any_ of them.

And Joe White _was_ dead. Had given his life to do what he'd sworn to Steve's father he would: protect Steve.

God_damn_, Danny felt like shit.

They stopped at the hood of the Camaro, rain still pouring down, both of them equally soaking wet now.

Danny suddenly saw his partner in a whole new light. (And it wasn't just because lightning was flashing overhead.)

"Neanderthal," Danny said, voice so quiet Steve could barely hear it over the rain pounding on the car.

Then Danny tossed Steve his keys.

Steve gave him his trademark lopsided grin as he opened the car door. "Prick," he said over the roof before sliding in.

Yeah, okay, Danny was letting him have that one. Because he was.

Sometimes.

But in the aftermath of something like this, of finding out your daughter could've been killed if your partner hadn't done what he'd done…even Daniel Williams didn't have it in him to give Steve shit for a goddamn thing.

Not the way he drove like a maniac through the rain as he handed Danny his cell phone so he could call Grace.

Not the way he gave Danny hell over what a mess the man had made of his house during his absence even as he boarded over the hole Danny had made in the window of his lanai door.

Not the way he pushed and shoved Danny up the stairs to the shower even as he was talking into the phone right next to Danny, listening to Grace chatter on about her next fairy tale story she was going to write about Prince Steve and Prince Danno, Rulers of the O'ahu Kingdom.

Oh, Danny would get back to being Danny tomorrow once the shock had worn off and he'd had his fill of his sweet Monkey's silliness.

But for tonight, in the aftermath of having his emotions torn every which way from Sunday, of having convinced himself he and the team would have to go save Steve again and-what-if-they-weren't-in-time-to-save-his-life...all Danny could get himself to do once he'd hung up with Grace, showered and let Steve bandage his cut-up hand was apologize.

"Noted," Steve said, then smirked. "Acceptance is pending."

Danny's eyes widened right before he launched himself at his partner.

And the next day, if Kono and Chin kept wondering why the formerly unharmed McGarrett was sporting a bruised jaw, and why _both_ of Danny's hands were wrapped in white gauze, well…the partners weren't going to do any explaining. In between the bickering, of course.

Besides…Kono and Chin weren't quite sure they _wanted_ to know…

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_Dictionary_

_kamaʻāina: a long-term resident of the Hawaiian Islands_

_brah: bro, friend_

_hoʻomaikaʻi ʻana: congratulations_

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_Author's Note: Me again! Just my standard self-promotion. I've got an original novel published if you get an urge to spend three bucks for something non-H50! Search either Smashwords or Amazon for Takers Chris Davis and you'll find it. It's the first in a series, with the second one coming out May 7th!_


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